Newsgroups: comp.robotics
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!news.media.mit.edu!minsky
From: minsky@media.mit.edu (Marvin Minsky)
Subject: Re: Artifical Muscles
Message-ID: <1995Jan23.054055.5547@news.media.mit.edu>
Sender: news@news.media.mit.edu (USENET News System)
Organization: MIT Media Laboratory
References: <3fsn8b$phi@crl12.crl.com> <1995Jan23.045934.4749@news.media.mit.edu> <3fveaj$pn4@crl.crl.com>
Date: Mon, 23 Jan 1995 05:40:55 GMT
Lines: 20

In article <3fveaj$pn4@crl.crl.com> dreed@crl.com (Darin L. Reed) writes:
>Marvin Minsky (minsky@media.mit.edu) wrote:
>: However, I'd be surprised if it stores more energy than a rubber band
>: of the same weight, and it's easy to cut same with a heated wire -- so
>: that might be a better alternative for one time use.
>: Come to think of it, is there any reason to suppose that nitinol is
>: better than a good steel spring for one-time uses?.
>
>I don't want to have to get inside my plane to reset the landing gear 
>after each flight. The steel spring would have to raise and lower the 
>gear somehow. More mechanically complicated than nitinol.
>-- 
>Tracy Reed
>Aerospace Engineering
>San Diego State University

You have to reset the nitinol, too.  But you can do it with another,
weaker nitinol wire.  I agree, it's a neat thing to use in such cases.

